About programing, a general question

[Joe Zeff]

On 12/22/2010 12:54 PM, Matthew Saltzman wrote:
> http://johnreece.com/wordpress/2006/07/10/real-programmers-dont-use-fortran-either/
>
> (I was but a tyke in those days, but my dad worked for Royal around the
> time this legend takes place.  He used to have publicity fliers for
> these machines lying around in his den that I poked through.  I don't
> think he knew Mel.  My programming days began with PDP-8s and S/370s,
> FORTRAN and PL/I.  And IBM 024 keypunch program cards.)

There's also a copy of that story at FOLDOC.  The first computer I ever 
programmed was an IBM 1620, Mod 2, with 20,000 individually addressable 
BCD digits, already obsolete in the late '60s when I first encountered 
it.  We started out with machine language, eventually graduating to 
Assembler and FORTRAN II.  I have fond memories of using an IBM 024 and 
found the concept of "cardimages" intuitive.  Now, of course, people 
find it hard to wrap their minds around the idea even after you explain 
it.  BTW, both Dan and Jerry also cut their teeth on the 1620.